November 2010 Indie Next List

“If you like a book featuring an unreliable narrator, you have found it. Miller is nine years old and struggling with the disappearance of his father, who may or may not have joined the army and gone to Iraq. Miller's 'mental health professional' strains the definition of the title 'professional.' Miller's mother is bitter and quite sure that joining the military is the last thing her husband would have done. And then there's Frederick Exley, who inhabits the novel through the relationship each of these characters has with his book, A Fan's Notes. Even if, like me, you have never read A Fan's Notes, you will feel rewarded by this smart and moving novel.”
— Stan Hynds, Northshire Bookstore, Manchester Center, VT
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Description

For young Miller Le Ray, life has become a search. A search for his dad, who may or may not have joined the army and gone to Iraq. A search for a notorious (and, unfortunately, deceased) writer, Frederick Exley, author of the "fictional memoir" "A Fan's Notes," who may hold the key to bringing Miller's father back. But most of all, his is a search for truth. As Miller says, "Sometimes you have to tell the truth about some of the stuff you've done so that people will believe you when you tell them the truth about other stuff you haven't done." In" Exley" as in his previous bestselling novel, "An Arsonist's Guide to Writers' Homes in New England," Brock Clarke takes his reader into a world that is both familiar and disorienting, thought-provoking and thoroughly entertaining. Told by Miller and Dr. Pahnee, both unreliable narrators, it becomes an exploration of the difference between what we believe to be real and what is in fact real.